A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement Deep Space

Deep Space by Chris Young and Scott Hedrick is a role playing game supplement published by R. Talsorian Games for use with Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0.

The supplement is available as a PDF from DriveThruRPG for $8, as a softcover print on demand book for $16 or as both PDF and print on demand book for $20. It is also available in the original printed form from sites such as Amazon. The PDF is the version reviewed, although it was purchased at a reduced price during a sale, and it has 122 pages, with two being the front and rear covers, two the front matter, one the Contents and one the back matter.

Chapter 1: On the Edge of Space starts by giving an overview of the different parts of space, with a rundown of where humanity has gone, followed by more detail on the locations from low orbit outward to the Belt, with a timelines of space exploration. There is also a map of the Earth/Moon system in 2025 and various colonies in it. Following this is a list of the major organisations that are in space; this is a combination of official government agencies, the USAF and some corporations, with a map of Earth and the major spaceport facilities. The different planets, and the asteroid belt, of the Solar System, together with some major moons, are given a rundown as to exploration done, or planned, and potential future use as well as difficulty in exploring or colonising them. Finally, there are tables of planetary data and communication lag times between the destination and Earth; these are divided into times at the closest and furthest approaches to Earth.

Chapter 2: The Environment of Space starts with the Triad; atmosphere, radiation and gravity, the critical three factors. Each of these is then looked into, with a look at how running out of oxygen, pressure and violating it work, with the amount of air in different sized habitats and how much damage they can take before being penetrated. Should there be a pressure drop, perhaps because a groundsider was foolish enough to fire a weapon, it looks at evacuating a module, using patches and what happens if they fail.

Radiation is next, looking at how much radiation damage a character can take, tables for the immediate effects of radiation, longer-term effects such as cancer and mutations and what effect radiation has on cybernetics. There are specific types of radiation, namely their sources, which are cosmic rays, power plants and nuclear drives and solar flares, with the chance of them occurring. The cancer rules are deliberately simplified.

Gravity is the final one of the three and it looks at the effect of zero gravity on a person, ways of staving off the effects, what happens over time as bodies adapt to space and what happens when a character returns to gravity. There are rules on combat in zero-gee as well as two new skills, zero-gee manoeuvre and zero-gee combat.

Chapter 3: Getting Around the Solar System starts with the hardware, which are the spaceships themselves. How the elements of a spacecraft are represented by codes is covered, followed by a variety of different spaceships. These come in surface to space, surface to orbit, orbital craft, small craft, battle satellites and deep space ships. The technology that makes up spaceships follows, which includes weapons, defences and software. Some details on getting around using orbital mechanics, in a simplified method, follows, along with a variety of space hazards. There are rules for combat between spaceships which, though simplified, are definitely at the harder end of the spectrum. Communicating with and from spaceships, and other planets, is looked at; lag is a significant factor in these cases which has an effect on netrunning, especially as the lag can be hours. This makes netrunning over long distances extremely dangerous. Finally, the psychological effects of long-distance travel and the possibility of interstellar travel are covered.

Chapter 4: Equipment and Weapons starts with Equipment, beginning with spacesuits of different kinds the chances of them failing and manoeuvring units to move them around. There are also bubble shelters and emergency bubbles for when spacesuits are not available.

Vehicles looks at the very similar Lunar and Mars Rovers; the Mars Rover has a few modifications different to the Lunar Rover to make it work on Mars. The Lunar Buggy is a small vehicle almost unchanged from the Apollo rovers, and is also available in a Martian variant. Hoppers are small flying vehicles and jet cycles are small vehicles used to move between satellites.

Tools looks at different tools, some of which needed modification for use in space, and various items of personal gear used by everyone on the High Frontier; Velcro is very common. There are also details on survival gear.

Weapons has descriptions and stats for the weapons used in space. Again, most of these were designed for space, especially those used in satellites where not blowing a hole in your residence becomes a very important factor in weapons use. This resulted in some specific designs intended to hurt people, not puncture space station skin.

Finally, Newtech 2025 looks at the cutting-edge technology available, nanotech, and its use in bioware, cryogenics, construction, space suits, computers and cyberware.

Chapter 5: Artificial Habitats looks at the different types of habitats used in space and on other planets. Space bases are workshacks, which are small stations intended to support research, manufacture and repair, autofactories, which produce with little or no crew presence, and battlestations, which are similar to workshacks but are built around a major weapon. Orbital colonies are stationed between Earth and Luna, and are Crystal Palace, a toroidal structure that rotates to provide gravity, and the O’Neill colonies, which are large rotating cylinders. Planetary bases are on the various moons and planets and an asteroid.

After the different things are given an overview, the costs, crew/passengers, sensors, computers, cargo capacity and weapon suites of the different kinds, with some being specific examples, are given. There are also some general and specific layouts of the different structures in the chapter.

Chapter 6: Living and Working in Space starts by looking at Highriders, the Earthside term for those born in space or spend most of their time working there. It looks at orbital culture, drugs (a bad idea for most of them) and braindance, the most common addiction, with a new skill, as well as sidebars covering common terms. There are space-born careers for those who work in space as well as new skills appropriate to the region. It then looks at what space characters wear and eat, cyberware and politics, along with various space-based companies called “Orbitals.” Finally, it looks at living in the Belt, the colonisation of new worlds and the possibility of terraforming.

Chapter 7: Red Conflict: A Space Adventure is an adventure intended to take the characters into space, and more than likely keep them there, as they are heading to the Mars colonies, which is at the very least a multi-year mission. The hiring, parts of the voyage, which is basically slept through, though not without brain activity, and the situation at the colony itself, where revolution is potentially happening, are covered.

Selected References is a bibliography of, probably now greatly out of date in some cases, reference works.

Deep Space in Review

The PDF is bookmarked with the major sections and major subsections linked. The Contents is to a similar level of depth. Navigation is okay. The text maintains a two-column format and appeared to be mostly free of errors. There are a variety of black and white illustrations, up to full page in size; the PDF is also based on a scan of the original book, but it’s a decent one.

As supplements go, this is a bit different. It covers space in a setting that, though more technologically advanced than the current day, either when it was published or now, when it comes to spaceflight, is not at a level of technology where spaceflight beyond the Earth-Lunar system is feasible as a regular occurrence. In other words, the supplement opens up the Solar System, and potentially beyond, but the setting isn’t really capable of handling that sort of expansion. The included adventure would cause a serious, and potentially permanent, change to an existing campaign.

Though covering all of the Solar System is interesting, given the state of technology, there’s a definite feeling that more concentration should have been placed on the parts of the system that are, comparatively, easy to get to. These are detailed, sometimes at a reasonable level, but once the Earth-Lunar system is left, the campaign is more than likely going to be permanently changed. Deep Space opens up a new, dangerous and disruptive area of the setting and it can be found by clicking here.